FairisleJunior SchoolSouthampton

Active Travel

At Fairisle Junior School we encourage active travel. If parents/carers have no choice but to drive to school, Sainsbury’s allow us to use their car park to park and stride to school. The route is a short and safe 5 minutes through several underpasses requiring no road crossing.

We have our own bike shed and scooter pod which enables pupils to part their bikes or scooters whilst they are at school. Each week a ‘Golden Lock’ is placed on a lucky bike or scooter and the owner gets to choose a prize!

We are proud to have achieved our Modeshift STARS Gold Award which recognises our efforts in supporting cycling, walking and other forms of sustainable travel.

To celebrate achieving out Gold Award, we all wore yellow clothes to school and planted a 'Golden Smiles' rose to commemorate the event.

We work alongside Southampton City Council, My Journey and Sustrans to promote active travel and help to make our children’s journey to and from school as safe as possible. The mobile camera car is in operation around the school site and a Penalty Charge Notice of £70 is issued to any cars found to be parking illegally.

Child-Friendly Streets Project

We are very excited and pleased to be taking part in the Child-Friendly Streets Project with Sustrans My Journey. This project aims to make the journey to school safer and the streets surrounding the school more child-friendly. Children, parents/carers, staff and local residents have been involved in workshops to establish what we all like and dislike about the journey to school and how it could be improved. Some of our children have been involved in using the feedback from the school community to design our perfect street.

Street Design Workshops

Street Design - designing a dream street!

Road Closure

On Friday 22 September we got to see what it would be like to have a more child-friendly street as Fairisle Road was closed for the afternoon. It was fantastic for the children to celebrate the road closure and enjoy taking part in a range of activities with family and friends. Great fun was had by all!

Fairisle Child Friendly Streets Southampton: “I think today has been great! Hopefully it will make parents think differently, and change their behaviour”

Chantelle, parent at our school

The Challenge:

Fairisle Road is blighted by traffic and insensitive parking from the school run. There is regular conflict between residents and parents/carers, as parents park on residents’ driveways, block access for emergency vehicles, and park on footpaths and green spaces, in order to park close to the school gates. Despite being a five minute walk away, use of the nearby Park & Stride is extremely low. School-run congestion makes it difficult for children (and adults) to be seen when crossing the road to get to school, so parents are reluctant to let their children walk/cycle/scoot to school.

Sustrans’ Solution:

Sustrans worked with students, parents/carers and residents to collaboratively review issues and opportunities, co-designing interventions to make the street more child friendly and improve air quality. We then closed the street for an afternoon to test out the designs. We helped the children recreate the designs for new crossings and activity trails, and used Sustrans street kit to test seating. The event was a huge success and encouraged positive conversations between the school, parents/carers and residents. The designs will be used by Southampton City Council, as and when funding becomes available for implementation.

Bike Skills Sessions

Thank you to Bike It Stuart for running Bike Skills Sessions for Year 3 and 4. The children enjoyed learning new valuable skills such as emergency stops.

Help yourself to leaflets and postcard in our school office to find out more about the benefits of travelling actively to school.